Again, contents for completionists. Who else thinks "hurray another puzzle, and hurray again another event" but completionists? Does it make my character stronger? No, does it give me new better weapons? No, does it change PvP in some way? No, does it change PvE in some way? No.

At the end of the day my character has not changed, PvP is the same zerge and PvE is the same zerge but hurray we got new puzzles and omg we got some more events that are more or less the same like all other events. Cosmetics.

They add content, not (imaginary) power gains. That's the way the franchise is, and how it's been marketed forever. Don't like it, fine, but don't complain because it's not the same design as other games...because, guess what, other games do that, that's not and will never be the design of the GW franchise.

Again, contents for completionists. Who else thinks "hurray another puzzle, and hurray again another event" but completionists? Does it make my character stronger? No, does it give me new better weapons? No, does it change PvP in some way? No, does it change PvE in some way? No.

At the end of the day my character has not changed, PvP is the same zerge and PvE is the same zerge but hurray we got new puzzles and omg we got some more events that are more or less the same like all other events. Cosmetics.

You picked the wrong game then.
And you really should try high-end PvP if you think it's all zerg.

Did they talk about the other elder dragons? I know that so far, the main big enemy is Zhaitan but I really want it to be super Jormag or the fire dude.

I would imagine these are going to be actual expansions, not content updates. The elder dragons are a pretty big deal and will probably expand our personal story pretty far, etc. I can't see them doing all of that stuff with the other dragons in just updates but hell it's ANet who knows...

Again, contents for completionists. Who else thinks "hurray another puzzle, and hurray again another event" but completionists? Does it make my character stronger? No, does it give me new better weapons? No, does it change PvP in some way? No, does it change PvE in some way? No.

At the end of the day my character has not changed, PvP is the same zerge and PvE is the same zerge but hurray we got new puzzles and omg we got some more events that are more or less the same like all other events. Cosmetics.

Again, contents for completionists. Who else thinks "hurray another puzzle, and hurray again another event" but completionists? Does it make my character stronger? No, does it give me new better weapons? No, does it change PvP in some way? No, does it change PvE in some way? No.

At the end of the day my character has not changed, PvP is the same zerge and PvE is the same zerge but hurray we got new puzzles and omg we got some more events that are more or less the same like all other events. Cosmetics.

For me, the problem with most MMORPGs right now is that the content is made with rushing in mind.

Content just doesn't last, the games themselves don't encourage their players to stick for a long time. They're all about dropping by in a rush and running off with all the good stuff.

That's the nature of theme park-ish MMOs, I am afraid. That content is meant to be disposable. You are suppose to desire as a player moving on to the next roller coaster. Not riding the tilt-a-whirl indefinitely.

It is a false and misplaced desire by the player to want to hang out in Gloamwood, Kingsmouth or Aerie Peak. Totally at odds with the design.

Again, contents for completionists. Who else thinks "hurray another puzzle, and hurray again another event" but completionists? Does it make my character stronger? No, does it give me new better weapons? No, does it change PvP in some way? No, does it change PvE in some way? No.

At the end of the day my character has not changed, PvP is the same zerge and PvE is the same zerge but hurray we got new puzzles and omg we got some more events that are more or less the same like all other events. Cosmetics.

Nothing changes about characters in any other games once they hit max level either, it's simply a matter of scale. Your character might get stronger, but so will your enemies, so it's generally a wash.

This game has a plethora of it's own issues, but the one your talking about really boils down to player perception, and nothing more.

Benevolence is a luxury for the strong - Wrathion
Plox. I got your plox right fucking here. - Animalhouse
I still prefer seeing Thrall rather than blood in my urine, that doesnt make him a good character. - Verdugo

Back when graphical MMO's were just getting started, they tended to attract the D&D/RPG crowd. In EverQuest you often saw people just "hanging out" or having guild meetings in places that they thought were cool. People explored, wandered about, journeyed around for the sake of journeying around. Part of it was the playerbase, part of it was just that it was a new type of game, and part of it was the game itself never really encouraging anything in particular.

Then the genre started attracting more players. These players wanted more of a "game" and less of a "world", so the developers catered to them, which attracted more of the same types of players, so the developers catered to them even more as the demographic grew, so on and so forth.

That and the genre is just aging. Few old-school MMO gamers are genuinely in awe of the little things like we probably used to be. Chances are even if you were the type of player that just hung out somewhere in EverQuest, you expect more from a game today.

I want you to think of FFXI for a moment. Even after several expansions, FFXI had less content than GW2 does at release. But it kept people coming back for a long time. Why? Hard, long-term goals. You couldn't just go beat down the end bosses at 75, heck you couldn't finish your main story at 75, even if you had other players helping you. FFXI had something that, at one time, was a pretty basic idea of MMOs and RPGs, and that was long-term goals to work towards.

Back when graphical MMO's were just getting started, they tended to attract the D&D/RPG crowd. In EverQuest you often saw people just "hanging out" or having guild meetings in places that they thought were cool. People explored, wandered about, journeyed around for the sake of journeying around. Part of it was the playerbase, part of it was just that it was a new type of game, and part of it was the game itself never really encouraging anything in particular.

Then the genre started attracting more players. These players wanted more of a "game" and less of a "world", so the developers catered to them, which attracted more of the same types of players, so the developers catered to them even more as the demographic grew, so on and so forth.

That and the genre is just aging. Few old-school MMO gamers are genuinely in awe of the little things like we probably used to be. Chances are even if you were the type of player that just hung out somewhere in EverQuest, you expect more from a game today.

I'd by and large agree with you. Many MMO's these days seem to actively try to be about the semi-immediate gratification route rather than any sort of long haul reward... and much of that has to do with behavior of players, some of it has to do with devs trying to come up with ways to isolate players FROM each other (for example, what passes for griefing in a game today is absolutely nothing like it used to be), or removing any semblance of consequence due to a decision making process on the part of the player. The cycle is "why is this so grindy" followed by "there's nothing to do!" after the first statement gets appeased. And games are suffering because of it.

---------- Post added 2012-10-24 at 06:29 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Fencers

Sally Standsinfire

This is a great name.

---------- Post added 2012-10-24 at 06:37 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Rukh

I don't think thats entirely it.

I want you to think of FFXI for a moment. Even after several expansions, FFXI had less content than GW2 does at release. But it kept people coming back for a long time. Why? Hard, long-term goals. You couldn't just go beat down the end bosses at 75, heck you couldn't finish your main story at 75, even if you had other players helping you. FFXI had something that, at one time, was a pretty basic idea of MMOs and RPGs, and that was long-term goals to work towards.

Or back even further, Asheron's Call had a technical max level of 126.... and even though there were non-combat means of getting experience by running your own guild (think pyramid scheme), the amount of xp needed to actually hit max was so high that for the first few years, you might only see 2 or 3 people per server even close to it. IIRC, 125-126 took more xp than 1-125 did.

Granted, you didn't need to be this level to experience all the game had to offer, but certainly it wasn't something even remotely easily attainable.

Benevolence is a luxury for the strong - Wrathion
Plox. I got your plox right fucking here. - Animalhouse
I still prefer seeing Thrall rather than blood in my urine, that doesnt make him a good character. - Verdugo

Well, so far Halloween event is like NOTHING interesting to me personally. Collect candies and bags and try to predict market is all I do. New jumping puzzle? Omg so cool. Not. New dungeon? In this game? No thanks.

Well, they said that they would have more pvp updates than LoL, but since it seems hard to find any GW2 player that also plays LoL noone seem to know what that means.... an update a month, an update a year?

It's like every 2-3 weeks for League. Basically every new champion also brings a slew of PVP re-balances. Sometimes there are just updates w/o new champions. Sometimes referred to as "mid-MONTH" patches. Like July's.